Conversation with a Conductor
by Takada Saiko
Summary: A short conversation between Erik and Reyer. I just love that funny little conductor so much! He entertains me greatly. Goes along with my series. R


**Conversation with a Conductor

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**

Erik had grown braver over the month that he and Christine had been engaged. He had moved from the shadows of the fifth box and the most hidden of places throughout the opera house to the shadows of backstage or even, if he felt truly daring on a particular day, somewhere on the floor, hidden by this and that. True, he was legally free of the issues that had contained him before – murder had never been looked upon lightly, had it? – but men still treated him as the monster they thought he was. The managers would have found something to keep him from his Christine if they knew…

She'd performed her final opera the night before. Well, final for a bit, as it was. Christine had told her fiancé very firmly that she wished to take a break of no less than three weeks – more than likely four – to enjoy being a wife. Now the Phantom stood in the vacant auditorium with silence as his only companion and the thought that by this time the next night he would be married.

It was those thoughts that he was dragged from when the sound of someone clearing their throat came from behind him. He whirled around, eyes wide and berating himself silently for not keeping his ears open. Monsieur Reyer stood with a pack of papers clutched tightly to himself, his every movement showing the fear that he was trying so desperately to hide.

"Monsieur," Erik greeted with a slight nod of his head. "Do you not sleep, sir?"

The elderly man seemed to relax a bit by the softness, almost musical sound of the Phantom's voice. He'd never really heard him simply speak. True, he'd heard him sing – at both performances of _Don Juan Triumphant_ – and he'd heard his voice echo through the room with a frightening tone to it. Even when he'd been told that the dreaded Opera Ghost would be performing the second time in his opera, he'd never spoken to him. Now he found himself responding as if he were carrying on a conversation with anyone else. "Of course, but it's rare that no one is in here. I come to play a bit…" He looked down. "Compose a bit."

Erik's eyes seemed to light up. "You compose, Monsieur Reyer?"

"Yes," the conductor responded, but then waved his hand as if to dismiss it. "But only very rarely. I have little time for it, you see." When the Phantom did not respond, he pulled up a bit more courage. "Why did you come this evening, Monsieur le Phantom?"

A smile spread across the younger man's lips at the sound of the other's voice as he spoke _phantom_. "There are few places I might go when I wish to get out."

Reyer coloured slightly in the face. "I'm sorry," he stumbled.

There was a silence and Erik ran his long, thin hand along the piano that they had been standing by. The conductor watched as the Phantom caressed the keys with a sort of elegance that the other had never seen and even with that small movement, a melody was whispered faintly into the still auditorium.

"I've seen you here," Reyer blurted out suddenly and without warning, "backstage, before the performances, in-between… With her." He was rambling, he knew, but it was flowing now. He had to know. "She's spoken of a fiancé. You know that, don't you?"

Erik's mismatched eyes were focused on the conductor now, cold as ice. "Are you the only one who has seen me?"

"As far as I know," Reyer managed, noting the hostility of the taller man.

The Phantom nodded. "She's spoken of a fiancé?" he echoed. "What did she say?"

"She only mentioned it," the older man mumbled. "I've heard what you do… I've seen it with Joseph Buquet! I heard what happened with Monsieur de Chagny."

"Nothing will happen," Erik assured him. A smile crossed his malformed lips and he turned to fully face the smaller man. "Because there is no one else."

"No one else?"

The Opera Ghost watched the other carefully. Monsieur Reyer had always been Erik's favorite of the conductors that had come and gone over the years of his time in the opera house and, he supposed, that was the reason on which he spoke almost freely with him. "Take heed this does not leave your mouth again. I would not want Christine hassled on my account."

"You, sir?" Reyer asked, realization finally sinking in.

"Is it so hard to believe?"

"Then will you… stop haunting the opera?"

A laugh echoed through the room. Not the horrible, maniacal laughter that Reyer had heard haunt these rooms, but a jovial, very much human laughter that was accompanied by an equally human smile. "Monsieur, I do fear you shall never be fully rid of me until I'm quite in my grave. Though… I do believe that the accidents my lessen."

A smile tugged at the conductor's lips. "Good."

Erik gave a small bow and started to move towards the shadows. "I'll leave you to your composing, Monsieur. Though I do ask, just as a favour mind you, to hear it someday."

"It's really not up to caliber with-"

"Nonsense," the Phantom cut him off. "Just a favour."

"Very well then. Good evening, Monsieur le Phantom."

"Good evening, Monsieur Reyer."

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A/N: Blah… I needed to write and I desperately wanted to write about Reyer. I finally got the PotO DVD the other day (happy!) and remembered seeing our lovely conductor doing his little jig during "Masquerade" and it makes me love him oh so much! Anyway, I've got a fluffy thing between Christine and Erik I'm thinking about writing, so off I go to do that and to watch my new movie :turns back, mystified, to watch the lovely Phantom:

TS


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